Shareholders want compensation
Wirecard sample trial begins with Watschn – for a court
Wirecard shareholders are demanding compensation for their immense losses. A model process is intended to speed up the processing of over 8,000 lawsuits. The oral hearing begins with a surprise.
The Wirecard model case surrounding claims for damages from injured shareholders began with a surprise: In the oral hearing, the 1st Civil Senate of the Bavarian Supreme Regional Court (BayObLG) tore apart the Munich I Regional Court’s submission on the “determination objectives” of the model case. “The legal quality of the referral order is, very carefully formulated, extremely poor,” said the chairwoman and BayObLG President Andrea Schmidt.
The hopes of tens of thousands of Wirecard shareholders rest on the Munich model case, for whom the bankruptcy of the DAX group in the summer of 2020 resulted in price losses amounting to billions – 50,000 Wirecard shareholders have registered claims totaling 8.5 billion euros with the insolvency administrator Michael Jaffé. 8,500 investors have sued for damages, and a further 19,000 have filed claims for damages without having filed a lawsuit. The Supreme Regional Court has selected a Hessian banker as a model plaintiff – virtually representative of the other shareholders – who, according to his lawyer Peter Mattil, lost half a million euros with Wirecard papers.
Shareholder mood “between anger and resignation”
Investors can then hope for compensation if they bought the respective shares because of intentionally false information. In the Wirecard case, it was the presumably fictitious profits – confirmed several times by the auditing firm EY. At the top of the list of “model defendants” is former Wirecard CEO Markus Braun, followed by EY in second place. The mood of shareholders fluctuates “between anger and still aggression and resignation,” said Daniela Bergdolt, lawyer and vice president, on the sidelines of the hearing the German Protection Association for Securities Ownership.
The model procedure is intended to speed up processing, as the Munich I Regional Court would otherwise have to process all 8,500 lawsuits individually. The Bavarian Supreme Regional Court should generally decide whether the shareholders are entitled to compensation. The findings presented by the regional court are the catalog of allegations against Wirecard and EY, which are to be examined in the test case.
Judge washes off the court
Senate Chairwoman Schmidt criticized the regional court for formulating these points in far too general terms – according to the judge, it should not remain unclear exactly which information was supposed to be incorrect. “It lacks any specificity.”
The payment service provider collapsed in 2020 because 1.9 billion euros allegedly booked in Philippine escrow accounts could not be found. The money is still missing today. The accusation is directed against EY that it did not properly examine the allegedly false Wirecard balance sheets. The auditing firm, however, sees no basis for claims for damages.
Shareholders can still hope
However, that does not mean that the injured shareholders have to give up hope of receiving compensation. Model plaintiff lawyer Mattil has prepared his own 800-page catalog of findings that the court will process. A verdict is not expected for a few years at the earliest. A shareholder – and in his followers from a distance also the model plaintiff who was not personally present – requested that the proceedings be transferred to the Munich Higher Regional Court (OLG).
dpa
Source: Stern
